Tag Archives | Breast Milk

The extremely wealthy regress to early childhood? The Taipei Times reports:

Human breast milk has become a new luxury for China’s rich, with some firms offering wet-nurse services, a report said. The report sparked heated debate in the media and on Chinese social media, with most users condemning the service as unethical.

Xinxinyu, a domestic staff agency in the booming city of Shenzhen, which borders Hong Kong, provided wet nurses for newborns, the sick and other adults who pay high prices for the milk’s fine nutrition, the Southern Metropolis Daily said. Wet nurses serving adults are paid about 16,000 yuan (US$2,610) a month — more than four times the Chinese average.

“Adult [clients] can drink it directly through breastfeeding, or they can always drink it from a breast pump if they feel embarrassed,” the report quoted company owner Lin Jun as saying.

Jill Krasny gives an overview of the history of Infant Formula, its corporate marketing to third world parents, and the tragic consequences. Every parent should know corporations may not necessarily be primarily concerned with consumers’ health and well-being.

A woman has been convicted of giving cannabis to her 3-month old baby through her breast milk, in what is believed to be the first case of its kind in New Zealand. The 29-year-old Wanganui woman was charged with administering a class C controlled drug, namely cannabis, to a person under the age of 18.

The charges were laid after a police search of a house for drugs. The woman’s partner also faced charges over the drug raid. Acting Senior Sergeant Andrew McDonald said the woman’s actions amounted to child abuse.

A lactating U.S. woman was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after she sprayed sheriff’s deputies with breast milk as they tried to remove her from a vehicle, police said on Monday.

Ohio-resident Stephanie Robinette, 30, was arrested and charged with domestic violence and assault linked to a domestic dispute, as well as resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, according to the Delaware County Sheriff’s Office.

It said Robinette’s husband told authorities the pair had been attending a wedding when his wife got drunk and started a dispute. He said that she hit him multiple times before locking herself in her car outside a banquet facility on Saturday.

Sheriff Walter L. Davis III said that when police approached the car to speak to her, she yelled profanities and refused to get out.

“When deputies attempted to remove Robinette from the vehicle she advised the deputies that she was a breastfeeding mother and proceeded to remove her right breast from her dress and began spraying deputies and the vehicle with her breast milk,” Davis said…

Scientists have created 300 cows that produce milk with some of the properties of human breast milk, including lysozyme, which fights bacteria and improves infants’ immune systems in their first few days of life.

Researchers in China introduced genes that express human lysozyme (also called HLZ) and other human proteins into Holstein cattle embryos, and implanted the embryos into surrogate cows. When the GM cows started lactating, their milk contained HLZ and two other proteins.

Using a new purification process, the researchers were apparently able to make the milk taste more human — they increased its fat content and changed the amounts of milk solids, according to the Telegraph.

A restaurant in London’s Covent Garden is serving a new range of ice cream, made with breast milk. The dessert, called Baby Gaga, is churned with donations from 15 women who responded to an advertisement on an online mothers’ forum.

One of the women, Victoria Hiley, 35, said if adults realised how tasty breast milk was more new mothers would be encouraged to breastfeed. Each serving of Baby Gaga at Icecreamists costs £14.

Mrs Hiley’s donation was expressed on site and pasteurised before being churned with Madagascan vanilla pods and lemon zest. Icecreamists founder Matt O’Connor placed an advert appealing for breast milk donations and believes his new recipe will be a success.

“If it’s good enough for our children, it’s good enough for the rest of us,” he said.